Discussion on:

10 technologies that are just plain broken

It is blatantly obvious that Microsoft has and is ignoring point #10; in their development of Windows 8. While it may be a great product for tablets, what is "in there" for the notebook and desktop users who rely on keyboards for interaction? As of now, very little.

Most people seem to either not realize it is there or continue to say the same thing in an effort to make Windows 8 look bad before release.

The fact is the desktop is still there. You can still use keyboard and mouse as you always have. Just because the new start screen on the desktop has been metro-ized doesn't mean Microsoft abandoned the traditional desktop (they didn't).

But they are making you go through an interface that you might not want to get there. It would be like making the touch interface on a tablet require you to select the app using a desktop. People would be pissed because it is awkward to get to the thing they want to use. Same thing but in reverse for desktop users. To add insult to it out of the box it requires you to go back to the clunky touch interface everytime you hit the start menu and want to select another app. You can pin them to your desktop/taskbar which is the only saving grace.

Apple with Lion, and Windows 8: the commercial OS makers seem to be so in love with "apps" that they forget that users dropping 1k+ on a desktop want a full featured application not angry birds.

I think this is something that isn't fully addressed from Microsoft or any other websites talking about the new Metro style apps. This "mode" if you will, can be disabled so that you have the desktop experience that you (as well as others) are comfortable with. I agree that the the desktop PC is not ready for the new layout, but I also think that it would be very cool to see on a tablet. Main point, they aren't ruining the desktop experience for anyone, just simply giving you another way to complete tasks (aka the Microsoft way).

It's not about where you run things from. It's about not covering things that are already running with something else when you want to start a second/third/15th app. It's about not using all the screen space for a single app or a switcher/launcher.

When you don't know from day to day which of over a thousand documents you are going to need, pinning the documents themselves is senseless. I pinned the customer sub-directories.

I agree with you rdawson, its quite tiring all the pontificating about" I cant stand the new desktop", its plainly obvious that they have never used the pre release Win 8.Far too much incorrect comment that are inaccuracies that are being taken as gospel but in reality are pure hearsay.

I am not a Windows 8 user, I am currently using Windows 7 and Linux (dual boot is a wonderful thing.)

That said, I think that you should remember that Windows 8 is currently Alpha software. This is a PROPOSED layout for the release, which is still a year away. I would expect that around half of the features that are in it will be dropped by the time it is released, and that there may well be features in the final release that are not in it yet.

As an Alpha release, You should be pleased that it runs at all.

Take another look at it in six months, if you are a Windows sort of person. Until then, what you see isn't necessarily what you will get.

If you still hate it, there is always Linux. Mint might be best for you right now, though Simply Mepis is also great. And Who knows, Canonical might even be hit by a massive wave of common sense by that time.

You're living on a completely different plane of existence if you honestly believe that Microsoft will abandon the new interface of Windows 8. Their entire argument for the existence of Windows 8 is based around the new interface! How could they abandon it? If they drop it, they can't release Windows 8, because it would be nothing more than Windows 7.1.

What you (and others like you) will soon discover is what the intelligent and experienced users have been saying for a long time, which is that Windows 8 will be a total and complete flop - something that will make the Vista flop look like a walk in the park by comparison. Microsoft needs to understand that if they want to produce an operating system for tablets, that's fine, produce one FOR tablets. But don't try to take your half-assed tablet operating system and force it onto the desktop and laptop market. Any and all employees that were part of that "brilliant" business decision should be fired en masse.

Have you used Windows 8? No, you haven't.
You MAY have used the developer preview, so what? This is developed so DEVELOPERS can use the DEVELOPER tools and API's of Windows 8 to see how to adjust the timeline of their applications.

Windows 8 is not about producing a tablet operating system, or a desktop operating system, but MERGING the two (as of now) VERY different worlds to give the user a similar/same experience in whatever device he/she happens to have handy.
Windows Applications (exe's) will still run on x86 and x64 systems and Win8/Web Apps will run on all systems x86/x64/ARM.

This is what consumers have wanted since the first smartphone, this is the way forward.
Therefore, Windows 8 will not flop, Windows 8 will be what Apple always wanted to be, One Ring to rule them all.

And you, sir, come 2013, shall be consuming your headwear....

(Oh and Re: "Can't release, Nothing more than Windows 7.1"...
It didn't stop the iPhone 4S outselling the iPhone 4 did it??)

Actually Windows 7 is Windows 6.1, check the build number.

Are you in reference to the phone or desktop?

There are several reasons WHY one would have a lower build number is because of the Win 7 version they have. In phones, the earliest versions DID have a build number of 6.1 in development; but not the OS Tower --- however, I have seen some laptops with this build number of 6.0 or 6.1 version in Windows 7 lowest edition.

Nevertheless, all of mine are well over the 7.xxx and higher as my Server is SPLIT; so I can run on this desktop on the Win 8 without wrecking havoc on the Win 7 Ultimate if Win 8 crashed.

If you know what you are doing, you can SPLIT your Server (as I have been doing this for years since Win 95 with 286, 386 and 486 Towers - I learned to split or divide them - when piloting or aka testing Win 98 which we know it as "BETA" in today's terminology). I have been splitting my Server into multiple Windows OS for testing but one also needs a heck a lot of TB's and power to run this BETA's today than it was back then and understanding how to run it in BIOS first in order to run which Windows OS you want to run off of.

A price to pay for this hard work; yet, having the back up is imperative as well in event of crash; especially with BETA - RC's.

While I cannot go into further discussion but I have found some detailed information which was disclosed to Microsoft that was very helpful to them as detailed as it was (consider it to be a form of "networking").

It DOES NOT MATTER what type of OS one is going to pick - Win, Mac, IBM, et al... you are always going to run into issues - period. There are no "perfect" and "flawless" computers out there; we wish there were, yet, the goal and desire to create perfection I cannot say isn't unrealistic nor can I say it can't be done either ... for I can say this:

For every pretty lovely Rose you see out there, there are tons of thorns in its way. So true in technology, all these thorn in its sides which hinders the pathways to attain to accomplishments, but one day, it will come to the point where it will become a bud, then a blossming blooming beautiful Rose that everyone would convet over for.

We will get there eventually... in my humble opinion.

It doesn't make sense to try to unite desktop and tablet applications in one release cycle. The best you can end up with is a hodge-podge of tablet users forced to use certain desktop-style apps in classic mode while desktop users (by default) have to go through a giant, inefficient touch UI with a mouse.

The two have to exist in separate, parallel devices until tablets and their apps can do everything we do on a PC -- which I'm just not sure is all that realistic. But it's definitely foolish to think you can drop users into a new UI with no transition. YES, it can be disabled. CAN be. But it's still the default, meaning one thing that'll have to be fixed before it's usable. Though if it wasn't the default, it would be as effective as Windows Media Center for replacing the DVR.

You are seeing things through the tunnel vision of the old way. I suppose you also thought the new start menu was horrible with XP and set it back to classic? Microsoft isn't stupid. If you've used this interface and can get outside of how you are comfortable and start actually looking at what the design is and where it's going, it makes a lot of sense.

It's the future. Dinosaurs will die.

Who told you Microsoft isn't stupid?

What about this company makes you think they are stupid? They've sold literally billions of licenses of software over the last 30 years. They entered console gaming in a tight market that had no room for anyone and took it over. With a bounty on their head for 15 years, they are still the king when it comes to OS and their software is run by all systems worldwide.

You may think you know everything, but this company can put their money where their mouth is. Those that call them stupid really just amplify their own stupidity.

They're not stupid, but they do have a history of throwing spaghetti at the wall to see if it sticks, vs. a more conscientious approach. That, and their exits are hardly graceful. It's either forced compliance, or complete abandonment.

Incidentally, no, I actually liked XP's changes. I'm not against change -- in fact, I think it's necessary. But not for change's sake, as is often the case with moving icons around in Control Panel, or using more context links on the left side of a window rather than plain, direct access. That's pointless and irritating. Sure, I can learn where it is, but now I have to remember the six ways to get to it when I walk someone through it over the phone. That's not good change. New is only better if it serves a purpose.

I see plenty of room in business for tablets and mobile devices. Not as a complete replacement though. At least not yet. Those technologies need to root themselves into our workflows before we can up and toss out the "old way". Designers are still figuring out how to leverage this new method of device/human interaction. We need bigger surfaces and more tactile response, and a completely different presentation. You can't just compile in a good touch interface.

There's a tool for every job. The mouse and keyboard aren't it for all tasks, but that's exactly what I'm on about here. One size does not fit all. It may sound alluring to have a single, unified platform that will run anything, but reality does not work that way. It's not ergonomic, intuitive, or efficient.

Give the touch UI time to grow and mature ON ITS OWN, then we'll talk about replacing "legacy" tools with it. Microsoft seems to be so used to being late to the party, that this time they're not hearing the community cry "too soon!" Fit the technology to the need.

So yes, Microsoft has a complete portfolio in the business market segment, and this has been largely unchallenged. That does not imply they're infallible. It just means they'll be able to crash and burn longer than a newcomer could. Resting on their laurels and making unwise decisions will not help their longevity -- monopoly or not.

> "What about this company makes you think they are stupid?
> They've sold literally billions of licenses of software over the last
> 30 years."

You seem to have this oh-so-cute vision of Microsoft, as though they're infallible and incapable of making mistakes. You seem to also confuse concepts very easily. For instance, you keep saying "Microsoft isn't stupid". True enough, because Microsoft is a large corporation, and therefore cannot be classified as "stupid". However, those working WITHIN that large corporation certainly ARE stupid, especially if they believe that Windows 8 (in its current form) will in any way be some kind of success story.

Microsoft isn't stupid, but some of its employees (both past and present) have a clear history of making horrendous business decisions. Your constant reference to dinosaurs only shows one thing -- that you're young and ignorant, and have no idea how the world works. You think that just because YOU like the new interface and aren't bothered by it, then nobody else should have any reason to complain either, right? Yeah...Microsoft isn't stupid, but people are.

If you want to keep banging the "Microsoft isn't stupid" drum, go ahead and tell it to brilliant minds responsible for bringing us Windows Millennium edition and Windows Vista. I realize that in all likelihood, you were still crapping in diapers when Windows Me was released, but rest assured, it was an epic failure, requiring XP to make up for the mess. In the same way, Vista was an equally-epic failure, requiring Windows 7 to make up for it.

Take comfort in the fact that Windows 8 WILL, in fact, be an epic failure, requiring Windows 9 to fix it.

"our money where their mouth is"

I used ME for several years on a machine the originally had 95 then upgraded to 98 and had less problems. I found the biggest problem was running IE 3 or 4 would crash 98 or ME, but Netscape would not. ME was released along side Server 2000, more as the workstation version similar to NT 3.5x or 4 having Server and Workstation versions, since the NT/9x line was not merged yet as XP did in 2002. Vista and 7 were more of a massive service pack like 95 and 98 were and version numbers seem to show this. 9x were version 4, XP was version 5, and Vista/7 are version 6, but sometimes Microsoft realized that a new name was needed instead of another service pack.

Microsoft has suggested that under Windows 8, Metro-Based apps will run under Hyper-V on Intel-based systems and natively on ARM-based systems. This suggests users will have a choice. I expect that Metro-based apps will not be as feature-rich as their desk-top-based cousins. For instance, I expect MS Office "Metro Edition" will be file compatible but will not offer anything but basic functionality for reviewing and editing files created on the desktop. On the desktop, I expect Windows 8 to look just like Windows 7 with non-Metro applications.

We will see when the public beta comes out early next year.

Admittedly a pre-beta release but I tried it out on my iMac (in a VM so could be the source of the problems). Anyways using a mouse and keyboard after installing the Virtual Box addins.
Horrible, plane horrible. Half the stuff I clicked on didn't open. "Swiping" the tiles left and right was painful, reminded me of trying to move around a map quickly in one of the old command and conquer games and at the same time trying to select units. You know how you used to get everyone but the 3 others you wanted, and when you tried again nothing got selected, or the ones you managed to select though you wanted them to move and ended up doing a march of death through the enemy base? Yeah that painful.
They need to bring back the true desktop mode for "normal" users. I understand that a reg-hack will get rid of the back to tiles start menu but out of the box? The system doesn't seem to detect that you don't have a touch enabled system so would probably want a keyboard/mice centric way of interacting at startup,not after going through a painful cludge of "touch like" mouse movements.

It was meant to show direction that Microsoft is headed with development. The main point being Metro styled apps need to be developed by developers. They did not include all the functionality of the start screen, which after reading the blog is quite a bit. The start screen is kind of a merger of the Start Menu, the taskbar, and the desktop. Once they iron out the transition of clicking on the start button, and increase the size of icons for desktop programs, it will make sense.

I had some issues loading certain apps until I installed silverlight I believe. I don't recall the exact issue, but my first impression was that the apps were just links to show the look and feel and then I installed a single peice of software and it all started working.

The interface issue will be addressed. I'm positive that they don't think that the mouse based interface is adequate. This was more to show developers direction and that you could have a touch based full fledge OS and to start developing for it because it's coming soon.

Where's Conan?

You were missed dearly.

5. Pulse Audio - the two little words is why I dropped Mandriva years ago, I used to pay for power pack because I believed in Mandriva and their product, but pulse audio wrecked it for me.

6. Web Browsers - Amen - I use Chrome almost exclusively now, which is funny because I was an IE user a year and a half ago. It's getting better, but having three web browsers because each handles certain things better than the former is ridiculous.

11. Android - Seriously Google needs to have more control over update release. This three tier system Google to OEM to Carrier for any update, even security updates is just a bad idea and turns $500 devices into throw away tech. In comparison, I just bought a new laptop for $780 and I don't expect to be purchasing a new one for a few years.

12. ThinApp - VMware, give portable apps back to the masses, please. VMware Workstation is great, but sandboxed apps is better still, better yet, give us a VMware OS that uses ThinApps to install applications. ESX and ESXi is a great idea, implement something like that on the workstation level.

13. Laptops - specifically touch-pads on laptops. I don't know what the solution is, but I have big hands, and I am constantly having to re-position my cursor because I accidentally brushed my thumb against it, and now they are getting BIGGER to accommodate Multi-Touch. My new Laptop has a touch pad the side of my HTC Sensation's screen, that is about 4.3inch corner to corner. I like the functionality and Samsung was nice enough to put in a function that temporarily disables the pad, but I still think there could be a better way

The list could go on, but you get the general idea. I think we have some exciting years ahead of us, regarding technological breakthroughs, and I can't wait. I also can't afford to try and keep up with the changes, especially in cases where tech has obsolescence built in. Personally, I blame Open Source. I think OS is great, but I think the smart phone industry is a shining example on why Linux hasn't gone main stream. With so many hobbyists advancing technology, it's hard for the hardware industry to keep up. If there were across the board "standards" for Linux, then maybe it could go mainstream, but then we'd lose innovation. It's a double edge sword.

As a parting thought, technology, by its very nature, is easily broken. It's why most every piece of tech hardware comes with sturdy packing. So you can box it up and send it back for a repair or replacement. You don't see fancy packing for Number 2 pencils, because they just work The High-speed Internet is the worst/best thing that could have happened to the software industry, without it companies would release a more polished product, but then we'd also be waiting for the next version to hit the store shelves before we could fix bugs. Anyone old enough to remember DOS 6.2 and 6.22?

Davbran, great comment/mini-post. Right there with you on all of the above including No. 2 pencils AND DOS. My first PC was a Tandy TRS-80 on which is used BASIC to generate printed reports as in:

10 lprint "This is the first sentence."
20 lprint "This is the second sentence."

At least you could count on it to work.

Except when you tried to save that code to the tape-drive (before floppies)

Man, you musta had a cool system...I built up my typing skills by re-typing in the program each time I turned on the trs-80 coco. I also went through 3 TVs real quick with this as the RF box was not very well insulated and would fry the TV receivers...lol

If they're like the Commodore 64 & VIC-20s (or my old Colecovision Adam), they were drives that used audio cassettes instead of floppies.

Or until you get an "out of memory" error when you use up all 64k of RAM!

That BASIC was a port of the first product from a couple of guys named Bill and Paul. They called their new company... Micro-Soft!

Just turn of "tapping" on your laptop touch pad and your problem will go away. It's in the mouse driver properties in Control Panel, or you might just be able to turn it off in the icon in the notification area near your clock.

thanks

That's a great idea, I never use that feature anyway.

The touch pad doesn't need to be smaller, it needs to be repositioned. It needs to be centered over the letter "B" on keyboard. Many are offset and the causes the problem. Earlier this year I returned what was otherwise a very nice HP laptop for just that reason.

@ Al_nyc

You have a switch on HP laptops that turns off the touchpad, usually at the top edge of the pad.

If you had looked, you could have used that and kept that "otherwise a very nice HP laptop." Mine has been turned off from the first day as I'd rather use a mouse; It is a very rare occasion when I have to use the pad.

I was looking at HPs last year, but they slightly bipolar state over the summer scared me off. It's nice to know about that feature though.

Totally agree. Continually typing away and wondering where the insertion point has disappeared to to find I'm inserting test at the top of the page.
Then with my new laptop I was baffled as to why my browser window kept zooming in and out- to discover that multi-touch was the problem. The point is, having discovered multi-touch on the laptop I'm genuinely baffled what earthly use it could be if you did find a use for it; it's so fiddly and imprecise I can only consign it to the "pointless gimmick" bin.

@ viggenboy

I have never seen a multitouch device except on ads or on tv (High-tech shows such as CSI, NCIS, Bones, etc) and they always use that on the screens themselves, which is where multitouch belongs, and nowhere else. So yes I would agree with you that a multitouch-enabled touchpad would be more of a nuisance than anything unless it were beside the computer (USB-connected) and at least of a decent size, such as 8 1/2 x 11. (I don't suppose that an individual user would be able to afford the touch tables they use on those shows, and we all know that there are wizards behind the scenes who do the actual computer work.)

I have to say this is the first time I have used one, though I had seen it advertised. My last laptop lasted me 6 or 7 years, so I am flying really fancy now. Pinch zooming is nice, and gesture swiping is nice as well. The only trouble I have with gesture scrolling, is I have been edge scrolling for years. To me this is an "It a broke" feature.

I agree about laptop touch-pads. I have never used one, they are so clumsy and, as you said, the slightest incidental contact messes up the cursor position. That's why I use a mouse and turn off the touch-pad completely.

I have never had a problem with Notebook touch pads and mouse both enabled (IBM, ACER, HP, ASUS) all have worked as expected.

If I am wanting a quick session I do NOT plug in the Mouse and use the touch pad.

If want to type a long document where I will be editing I plug in the mouse and use that.

I would love to have a simple switch that turns off the touchpad when a mouse is present and turns it back on otherwise.

The point about the web browsers is mostly a result of each vendor trying to attract customers based on what they think is wanted and a lack of adherence to standards.

I had an Acer Aspire 5200 notebook a little while back, and it came with a software extension that automatically disabled the pad when a mouse was coneected. I suspect most (if not all) laptops come with the same extension. Also, the same notebook I had had a button next to the power button that would allow you to manually disable the pad.

Hey JD - never thought to look . . . . There is a switch!!

This is a feature I did think was snazzy, and the worst part is I never would have thought about it myself.

I really loath touchpads, give me the little red point stick any day.

haha - I thought people hated those more than touch pads. I never could get a good feel for those.

I absolutely LOATH the touchpad.

A lot of us like them, once you get used to the point stick it's really easy to use, precise, and it's far more compact than a touch pad. I'm typing this on a little IBM X60 ThinkPad that has a point stick and no touch pad, and that's the way I like it!

They got dirty and you had to clean them, but man were they handy on a laptop because they were up on the screen and you didn't have the annoying habit of hitting them with your finger. They also didn't do that ghost movement you got with the sticks sometimes. Love the old trackball, wish some mfg would wise up and bring them back.

Every recent Windows laptop and netbook I've used has an option to disable the touchpad when a USB mouse is plugged in...some also have a keyboard function key combination to do the same. Check your control panel...mouse settings for a checkbox to do just that. If it's not there, try updating the touchpad driver (you also may be able to get to the settings from your system tray icon...check the hidden icons if there's not a touchpad icon showing.

There are free touchpad utilities that turn off the touchpad when you're typing and have largely resolved this issue for me. Do a search for "TouchFreeze" download and install it. This should really be a part of Windows, or at least pre-installed on every laptop with a touchpad.

I have to say, I don't know why I never thought of searching for such a utility. I just figured it was one of those things that annoyed me, but had to live with, like that spot on my back I can't scratch with my own hands. Opposable thumbs aren't an evolutionary leap, give me opposable arms

I cringe when someone calls with a printing problem whether its a driver incompatibility, remote printing via Terminal Services or a manufacturers helpful software popping up behind the scenes in session 0 (I'm looking at you HP)...the printing situation is getting worse, not better. I'm almost relieved when I'm asked to setup an older non-host based printer that doesn't use the universal driver.

Just the other day a colleague and I were talking about how computer technologies have all evolved over the past 10-20 years...except for printers. Yes, we have come from dot matrix to laser/ink jet....but they are still a big black hole of suck!!!

Skuis could have mentioned Canon, who don't update the drivers (even for new and expensive machines) when there's a new version of Windoze. Do they expect us to buy a new printer from Canon each time the OS is "upgraded"?

Not that I'm a Microsoft fan, but having worked in enterprise environments with both Lotus Notes/Domino and Outlook/Exchange, I'll take Outlook/Exchange over the former any day.

Cant imagine what the author is referring to with Outlook. Exchange isn't a challenge to setup either. Try Lotus.... And domino.... Hahaha

Agreed, I wonder where they come up with this stuff sometimes.

I've been using and supporting Outlook and Exchange from the time they were first released ('96?).

I am no fan of Microsoft, but I think Outlook and Exchange are some of the best software products ever made. They just work. For years. Without requiring much maintenance or intervention. My current Exchange server (2007) has been running for 4 years with no major hiccups. The author couldn't be more wrong.

Just about every MS 2010 product that's come out -- Office, Exchange, you name it -- is full of fail.

Having implemented Exchange 2010 and been running it in a corporate environment, I cna honestly say it's been highly reliable and easy to work with (once I knew where everything was). W even have Outlook 2003 clints still connecting. And I found Office 2010 just as easy to use as any other version.

When there were more actively developed competitors to Outlook, it was a fussy, sluggish, high maintenance email client that was inferior to even Outlook Express in mail handling. When paired with an Exchange Server, you mostly created job security for MCSE's and the like. Now that there are so few commercial desktop competitors, it's like Microsoft doesn't really care anymore. Mail merging in Outlook 2010, as some people I know have recently found out with their holiday card mailings, is even worse than before, which I didn't think was possible. Its autoarchiving is still too random and unmanageable for the average user with high email volume. And why oh why can't they set autocomplete to scan the contact lists automatically the way Outlook Express use to handle it so easily and fuss free?

The businesses I know who have replaced their Outlook/Exchange system with Google Apps, once the initial quirks were worked, mostly regretted not doing with this sooner, especially after having to deal with high priced IT support trying (usually unsuccessfully) to keep increasingly unstable SBS/Exchange Server systems running smoothly again.

I've noticed time to time people claiming how trouble free their Exchange systems have been. I have never seen this in real life, and even people I know who have hosted Exchange systems have periodic problems. The only stable, low maintenance server systems I've seen for Outlook have been Exchange replacements, like Merak and Kerio, and with Outlook using a connector program to make it act like it was connected to an Exchange Server

Of all the MTA's out there, I've installed them all over the last 15 years. The best I can for Outlook/Exchange is it's the best of all the crap-ware.

You'll have to evaluate something else in your spare time to properly round out your opinions. If you haven't tried Zimbra you are missing out on something quite brilliant.

It is the easiest thing for both users and admins. I've done a hundred Exchange migrations and, after trying Zimbra, there's no going back.

For admins, the install and configuration can't take more than 60 minutes start to stop but - you have to be willing to read. After that its all cake. Upgrades and patching occur in about 30 minute intervals and - it can all be automated. Fix one server, automate, fix the rest with the automation. Clean and neat.

For clients, the Web UI is all Ajax and therefore supports right-clicking on anything: emails, folders, calendar items - you name it. Taking Outlook away and using a web ui not only makes the Inbox far more accessible internally AND externally, it radically reduces the possibility of viruses getting TO the desktop in the first place; ie: no more need for costly AV packages that dominate your desktops; a much lighter solution can then be used and VPNs are no longer required for checking email in the office.

But here's where the change become critical. Let's say you support a company with Zimbra. Their top Salesman is at a meeting and he forgot to bring one important document. He simply creates an email on his cell phone, goes to add an attachment and gets the missing document; he then sends the email and closes the deal - right there in the meeting.

OWA cannot do that.

But wait - there's more. The Zimbra contacts can be associated with Asterisk. You can place calls by going into your contacts, right-clicking on their phone number and selecting dial.

Since Zimbra uses OpenLDAP, the technology that Active Directory emulates, you can store anything in your Zimbra ldap database. With the addition of Zimlets, Zimbra can then be connected with X number of OTHER applications:
http://gallery.zimbra.com

But mostly, I just like golfing which I can now do more of...if the email server isn't causing me headaches, I can sit around doing less reactive work, and put more time towards proactive work like making new sales and getting more clients. After that, I'm golfing about 60% more than I used to.

Outlook/Exchange are great - for what they are. But, it is certainly not the best thing going; Zimbra has proved that to me in a time-return, customer satisfaction, and an over-all reduction in support expenses.

Take a look around. The only thing you stand to lose is frustration.

Outlook is fine. Pretty much ever end-user complaint we receive regarding Outlook is a result of that user abusing Outlook and expecting it to do things for which it was never designed. Outlook has spoiled a lot of our employees in that regard. And now they use it as if it's the all-encompassing application; not just an email and calendar client.

pssstt.,.. there's a hint! PST files are supposedly the way to allow a user to keep old data and still comply with the culture of data poverty that still dictates in corporate land. I set up auto archive to keep the trimming of my mailbox under control. But if it's to an offline device, I'm warned every time I open Outlook (it wants to have it open). If it's to the C: drive, I lose my access to it from home. Then how many times do you see partially-identified "Private Folders" in your list from multiple attempts to set up a decent scheme? Compared with the free offerings from the likes of Gmail and Yahoo, usability is a problem for Outlook. I challenge an administrator to argue this proposition: an unlimited "Inbox", searchable on text or tag, is far more useful than a hierarchy of single-allocation folders variously distributed over a plethora of 'archives'.

Wow, I'm an Exchange Ninja and I didn't even know it. I get the impression the author doesn't stray very far from the command line or this was all supoosed to be tongue and cheek. If so not very well done but I doubt that it was.
...and about Symantec End Point Protection working. Sure it does as long as you have a machine dedicated to provide the rescources it's going to hog and a tech to monitor it 24/7.

That thing is a system hog! We had to roll out an upgrade in RAM to our (almost) entire fleet of 500 machines to be able to run it at a reasonable level and still allow staff to work. Symantec's claims of improvements haven't made any difference either.

I've pointed a completely up-to-date SEP at a known 6 month old virus file and it came back telling me that the file was clean!?!

It DOES NOT work, plain and simple.

Not to mention the number of our sites that it has crippled with updates. Its remote install and update procedures are absolutely far from ideal. If the transfer gets interupted, or the machine fills up, SEP Server just trys and trys and trys to send the files which saturates the WAN link.

Which brings me to my other gripe: A typical SEP install consumes 800Mb to 1Gb of hard drive space and the updates are well over 100Mb at a time.

What we need is Whitelist scanning. Blacklist scanning is just getting too cumbersome.

Now there is something SERIOUSLY unuseable unless you have a team of rocket scientists available.

Whenever I hear users complain about Outlook (and there are some very legitimate complains) all I can think about it... try Lotus Notes! The author hasn't tried enough software if Lotus Notes doesn't make the list.

As a user, I've used both Lotus and LookOut (Oops, Outlook) and I find them to be about the same. Of course, I have never tried to administer them. I find that I like the Mozilla client Thunderbird more than Outlook for web based email though. It shouldn't be too hard to use that, with the calander application Lightning on an enterprise server.

I have heard many of the same complaints about the Evolution server on Linux that I hear about Domino and Exchange. Combined services email servers seem to be the pitts.

We were recently given a fleet of new laptops. It took weeks for the techs to get around to everyone and set up Outlook--don't know why; it used to work when we set it up ourselves. Anyway, Outlook would work alright for a week or two, and then blammo! What changed? Nobody seems to know, because it takes the techies a long time to fix it--if they manage it at all.

You need to blame something other than Outlook because it just works. Sounds like your techies are clueless.

How do you install exchange badly ? done few installed form exchange 5.5 to exchnage 2007 never had a problem . Outlook might crash a few times but generally it works

Exchange can have a bad install just like any other piece of software. There are quite a few factors that can decide for you whether something installs properly, partially, or not at all. Hardware, other software, what happens to be running at that same time, etc.

Connectors, problems in AD schema (especially when merging companies), moving mail, lack of good tools for searching mailboxes for compliance / forensics issues, etc.

Also, with Outlook: The god-awful Windows search indexer. I want to meet that designer in a dark alley so I can invite them to a crowded pub, buy him/her a beer, and then pants them.

Doesn't matter whether you check the box or not - it won't save. Never has. Never will. Outlook has been broken for over 10 years. Why even have the check box?

How about deleting a large number of emails at once? I had a CEO with 30,000 emails in one folder. Deleting any more than 1,000 would crash the program.

Same goes for searching big folders. Crash. Ctrl-Alt_del and kill it by hand.

I have an employee I email every day. But he only shows up in the address history by his last name. Other people show up by first name - even employees who have been gone for over a year or people I emailed one time two years ago - but not the guy I email EVERY DAY.

Would also be nice to connect to more than one (and only one) Exchange Server. If you belong to a large company with several business units with their own email servers you need to choose.

Each of the issues you mention are local ( PC or laptop ) related and have nothing to do with Exchange Server. Address history is maintained on the local device, not the server. As for connecting to multiple servers, Exchange if set up correctly uses more than 1 server but the user is not supposed to need to choose. If connecting to outside companies, then yes, but that too is an easy fix. Google it.

Several occasions Outlook would disconnect from the server and wouldn't get email nor would it send it. No amount of configuration changes or adjusting would do anything. There was no errors when it wouldn't get emails. It just wouldn't get them.
Quitting Outlook and re-launching it would allow it to connect and get emails again. I agree with ChrisTheta. I've seen some really freaky, inexplicable crap from Outlook and Outlook Express. I've also seen a large number of companies out there that produce data rescue utilities that rescue data when Outlook screws it up. If it's so solid, why are there so many rescue utilities...

There are odd glitches out there for Outlook (I am not even touching outlook express which is a whole different scenario), but from my experience they are more the exception rather than the rule. Administered an exchange 2003/outlook 2003 install for 5 years and the main issue I had was user related issues or network configuration issues (DNS).

The reason there are so many rescue tools is because there is a huge base of users. With a large user base there will always be scenarios where there is data corruption which creates demand for repair tools. There are a lot of scenarios where an applications data can be corrupted that isn't because of the application (such as a failing hard drive)

Bill

Outlook or Outlook Express, because they are two entirely different programs written on different code bases. Outlook Express was not particularily good, but was a consumer-side product, so irrelevant when discussing Exchange.

He didn't say his problem was Exchange, He said it was Outlook.

the program would crash because the computer could not process that functionality. upper management non IT employees will run outlook into the ground (and assuredly they will run any other piece of software into the ground)

I would have to agree. We have been using Outlook & Exchange 2007 with very little problems for over four years. We have occasional problems, however the fix is usually to delete the Outlook profile and let Outlook recreate it. That fixes a great deal of problems I have found. I have to say though having been a Notes Admin and an Exchange Admin I prefer Exchange.

Exchange and outlook pretty much work in the defacto install. The only time we lose connectivity is when the cabling between is unplugged.

I agree wholeheartedly, Lotus is quite possible one of the worst designed, worst functioning, slowest, most convoluted applications I have ever used, and had to support, and thats just the client, I dont even want to get started on the domino server...

I don't really think of myself as an "Exchange Ninja", but I've never had problems with my clients not being able to connect Outlook to Exchange. Setting up reverse look-up correctly seems to be a bigger and more widespread challenge for e-mail server admins - and that issue is universal (it doesn't matter what server you're running, if you don't have reverse look-up set correctly, there are a lot of domains that are going to reject your incoming e-mail).

How is a misconfigured Exchange server the fault of Outlook? The author needs to explain that.

Agreed, Outlook/Exchange is a breeze compared to Lotus Notes. I have issues with some of the way Outlook does things (using Word as an email editor always causes problems), but if you can't connect Outlook to your Exchange server...find a new job!

I disagree with John_LI_IT_Guy, upgrading Domino servers or migrating it to another server is very easy and barely can take 15min, and the rest of the time is copying mail boxes.
If you are going to do that in Exchange, this will be a nightmare.
So, from admin point of view Lotus / Domino win.
In addition you can build and run applications in Lotus/Domino, which is something you can't do in Outlook / Exchange

Actually, Outlook is quite broken. I'm not refferring to Exchange (thankfully, I'm not in charge of setting up Exchange at my workplace), but do any of you design email? The HTML rendering engine in Outlook is a NIGHTMARE! They use the Word rendering engine instead of the IE engine. This means emails have to be laid out with a mess of tables and other sloppy techniques from about 10 years ago.

Of course this also happens with a lot of other email clients. Don't even get me started on Gmail (they rip out all your styling!!!)...

Type.
If it's a sales email to customers, place company logo at top of page and insert links as required.
Send.

Your customers will appreciate that they don't have to download a megabyte or two to be able to read your sales pitch.

You should qualify that comment John_Li. Most people who can't handle Domino support just don't know the product. Most of the time dislike or fear oof something stems from ignorance. I can have a Domino server running and begin dropping mail files into the running system in 15 minutes. The mail files are automatically recognised as the copy completes and an online consistence check is run. I have had Domino servers running on the same metal for 5 or 6 years ore more. Don't criticise what you don't understand.

If you are talking about the email portion of Lotus and not the appication part, then I agree that Outlook/Exchange is better. But Lotus is underrated when it comes to the app side. I worked for 2 companies that utilized it and it was almost endless as to what you could do with it.

At my office, we've never had a major problem with Exchange/Outlook - every once in a blue moon, the connection drops, but there isn't much more to it than restarting Outlook. Maybe you don't have the best handle on the platform, being a Linux evangelist? The IT staff we've had, outsourced and inhouse, were not great geniuses, but they had and have Exchange/Outlook working just fine.

Consumer A/V isn't the problem - it's the moron users. I haven't had a virus for 15 years. I've been using Avast for 4 years or so, and it's almost bullet-proof. Symantec EP, on the other hand, is godawful. It doesn't work well with Win7x64, it doesn't detect things it really should (keyloggers and forkbombs come to mind), it doesn't appear to scan compressed archives, it bogs the system down to being almost useless when it kicks off a scan. If you miss an automatic scan, it doesn't prompt, it just starts, nearly bringing the PC to its knees.

As for browsers, I use Opera and it's nearly perfect. For the rare site that won't play nice, IE9 (or even 8) works fine. FF has lost my trust, and I never trusted Chrome in the first place. Yes, I keep FF & Chrome around for dev purposes (unlike some, I do actually test on all major browsers) but I never use them for surfing.

As to the others techs I'm familiar with, I'll go along with those. Flash sucks and needs to die. Desktop multi-touch is beyond retarded. Predictive typing feels like I'm being trolled by my phone.

Why did you lose your trust with FF? Works well for me. I'm using it right now.

Try programming against a new release every 6 months. We have stopped updating Firefox and we will not test our web sites in it until they stabilize. Atleast with IE6/7/8 we know the enemy's limitations and release schedule.

I hate to say it, but I agree that the frequent update changes to Firefox are a problem.

I am using Firefox, and I love it, but, I don't like the constant changes when the updates are used. I can really see why it would cause problems in a business setting.

You should consider having users with Firefox update only at certain times.

If your business is web related, then you can't ignore the Fox, as 1/4 of the web uses Firefox right now. That looks to be a long time stable number. Chrome is growing at the expense of IE. The rest can be ignored.

The best thing for you might be to just write for HTML5. IE claims to be going there, Firefox is too. Chrome says they want to be the standard HTML5 reference. Webkit is taking Safari there, and Opera is very good in complying with W3C standards.

Once both Apple and Microsoft bring aboard MP8 support, then HTML5 will be where you need to be.

Yup, we also thought the author was on the far side of the moon on that one. SEP for us was horrific on our primary domain controller.

More horrific was what we perceived to be Symantec covering the issue on the first months in the forums by making such search of the keywords to have no results. Given it was some years ago, we feel to have been scarred by life since we were blamed for the problems until we pinpointed SEP11.

SEP was awful. A resource hog. It didn't pick up as many issues as our current AVG. Backup Exec was pretty good until Symantec got hold of it.

I agree with Mark. Anything Symantec is a resource hog. Want a good antivirus solution with a small footprint? Try Vipre Business from Sunbelt Software. I can run full scans on workstations from the console and users don't even know it is scanning.

We have been using VIPRE Enterprise for three years now. All users hate it and I as admin hate it too. We have upgraded all hardware, we have not a single machine that is not core 2 duo and has less that 2GB or RAM; still this sucker takes couple of hours to run a regular ("quick" they call it - what a joke!) scan (not a deep one) and hogs the PCs down. My laptop (a Core 2 Duo with 4GB RAM and running XP Pro SP3) with only FF and TB open will slow down to a crawl when the scanner kicks in.
One of the reasons we dropped Symantec Enterprise AV years ago was that beside not covering as many threats as other AV solutions it had a pretty bad admin console. We bought into VIPRE mainly because of its claims of being light on the resource (the fastest and lightest - their adds claim) and for having a good central management console. The latter is good, no questions; but the engine sucks!
I've submitted many support tickets over the years and after upgrades of hardware and software and promises of the program to get better at not being a resource hog, we gave up. We are thinking to drop VIPRE and find another solution, but so far we have no candidate for a substitute.

These negative rants always bring out some really good comments. Veritas was great before symantec got it. Endpoint Protection failed repeatedly side by side with Corporate Edition at detecting viruses (even when their website stated specifically the updates would catch it). Something changed in the scan engine and it also became a huge bloatware that caused server problems from the central console. I even "contracted" a virus and spent 3 days on the phone with them (knowing all along how to kill the virus) to see how they would handle it and why it wasn't prevented to begin with. They had me do registry hacks and use 3rd party software I'd never heard of and I ended up formatting and reinstalling and they said "oh, it's a new variant" which it wasn't. I even requested several other techs get involved on the case to be sure it wasn't a newb. That solidified leaving them for good and I had documentation to prove it! I use MS security essentials now, but no central console. One single virus got by in the past year which was a trojan dropper type and was part of Adobe flash install so MS didn't react properly to it - I contacted Adobe and it was removed from their site 4 hours later and they disavow any knowledge of it of course.

I was surprised he didnt bash avast, but I agree with you, its a pretty solid AV, doesnt hog resources like Symantec or McAfee, which McAfee is quite possibly the worst one out there, I have had McAfee bring disaster recovery exercises to their knees because all the machines would kick off a scan at the same time in the middle of the exercise, and since most end users arent intelligent enough to kill a process on their own, I get to go around ending the scan on about half the machines when the user is incapable of following a simple direction..

I am surprised he bashed AVG.

I left them years ago simply because they went commercial, but until then I had never had a problem with their software, and it worked hand in hand with Zone Alarm.

I currently use Avast! and have never had any problem with them through two laptops and three desktops. And Zone Alarm still works great!

I stay away from Symantec and MacAfee products because they are so prominent that they themselves are targets of the malfeasants. And their updates are late. I usually get at least two updates a day on Avast! (I'm on 24/7)

I helped a couple people with slowing issues after installing AVG free. Had to add some RAM to get the machine working properly again (old slow machines). I've had people get viruses while running AVG, but I think that can be said for any antivirus software.

Bill

14 - ChromeOS - When I first heard about ChromeOS I had no idea that it was going to be a "firmware" OS. I've always felt that is should have been more tablet oriented, rather than netbook oriented. Recently, I was thinking, that ChromeOS would make a great Set-Top OS. Anyone remember WebTV? A ChromeOS box with a blu-ray player strapped to it would make a nice Television Web-Interface.

ChromeOS is still around and google has released also a version of Android for the X86 platform. Personally, I say scrap the ChromeOS and make Android into an OS that works on all devices across the board. Apps will work everywhere.

Google has released that they are working to make an android-style OS for the desktop environment. http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/156267/startup_founders_turn_android_into_desktop_os.html

I have found Outlook to be the best email client, ESPECIALLY when paired with Exchange.

I suggest substituting printing to shared printers in a mixed 32/64 bit environment in it's place.

I believe there is one missing technology : email (in general).

Spam...
Lame attempts such as SPF, DomainKeys, SenderId to make it reliable...

Oh, and not as important as email, but ftp is also some broken technology.

" What we need is a desk with a built-in multi-touch display on a horizontal surface."
...just see what that would do to your neck and back! Would such a device come with free for life chiropractic treatment??

Oh, you mean like you get in a traditional draughting office?

You just need the ability to tilt the desk to a comfortable angle.

This is something I've wanted for years.

Your monitor should be at eye level. If your bending your neck down, up, or to the side to see the monitor, your stressing it.

Touch as we know it will never work on the desktop. Maybe a touch pad on the desk or some kinect like control.

Agreed. Touch / kinect has a lot of potential to help. A horizontal desk top is a horrible idea. That is just like using a tablet with no stand. Google "ipad neck pain" and you'll see this is an issue. I have experienced it myself.

I would agree that in most cases, a horizontal desk will do more harm than good. However, it would have some advantages. A friend of mine claims to own a prototype of one (I have yet to see it for myself) that he uses for music purposes (he is a member of a techno group). I can see the advantage for that type of use, as well as architectural and artistic use; but otherwise it should at Least be tilted (and I was told by the same person that it Can tilt when needed).

That in conjunction with a laser-driven display such as is available for some keyboards, where a small laser projects an image onto any surface and the user then, in this case, types as if on a regular keyboard and the pickup unit "sees" which keys you used and tells the CPU what to type onto the screen and into the program you're using. Then your "touchscreen" could be as big as you need it to be; just refocus the pickup unit to the size of the work area you need. The technology then would be affordable by more people including moderately well-heeled individuals.

"eye level" (fremonty) you're is the correct usage.
"Do you want to save your password" (Chris Theta) I have used Outlook at home (no Exchenge) and it saves my password with no trouble. It has been years since we had Oultook/Exchange here at work and here they frown oin saved passwords.

than the horizontal keyboard and mouse we use now? Some tilting options would be nice, but it really isn't much different than our current method of entry.

Sitting at a keyboard and mouse while looking at a vertically oriented monitor is a natural sitting position. Hunching over a horizontal display which is also your typing surface would result in worse posture than writing on paper.

Anyone that has used a proper drafting board knows there is a way to do this. Tilt the desk!

Why does everyone get hung up on the shape of desks? This stuff is not set in stone and it's obvious we'll need to change the way we do things if we want to make the best possible use of technology.

We all had to learn how to use a mouse, how to use a keyboard,... Why would you possibly think you'll never have to learn a new interface in you life? Why would you think the first one you learnt is the best? Why aren't you happy to spend as much time learning a new interface as you did on the first few?

I think the reluctance is that time is precious, and as the number of interface "solutions" explodes, you've gotta pick the changes that will have a net gain of time, or you'll spend all your time learning new things without doing. Once a user becomes proficient in an interface, they will become much LESS proficient (and efficient with their time) when adjusting to a new one (for awhile, anyway). If you want to accomplish a task, and one interface lets you get exactly the end result you want, then "good enough" is, simply, good enough. The interface newcomer really needs to show a substantial time savings (or feature improvement) to justify the time, IMO.

In my experience, it was a resource hog that rolled over for just about any type of virus. The amount of computers I had to reformat while using Symantec was absurd.

Printing has been mentioned - can we just label the entire printer industry as broken? Although I'm sure the manufacturers think it's just fine, I'm having trouble thinking of an entire computer-related industry that is as anti-consumer, what with the exorbitant ink prices and built-in countermeasures to prevent cartridge reuse.

# iOS

You buy a device, that you can't do what you want with. You use it Apple's way, or you don't use it at all. Hang on a minute, this is 'my' device ... right?

I believe PDFs are ill suited for document delivery and consumption.

1. Good for documents that you are ultimately going to print but really poor for online usage.
2. Usually wrong orientation (A4 versus being built for the display)
3. Poor experience on a mobile. Scrolling to death.
4. Top down navigation is not best metaphor for information discovery and usage.
5. Adobe viewer is big in terms of install etc.
6. Often has security loopholes and patches.
7. Documents tend to be bigger in size than other available technologies.

Royal Mail use it for buying/printing postage online - WHAT A TOTAL UNMITIGATED DISASTER THAT IS - AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHH!!

Absolutely 100% with you there. What an amazingly dumb time to decide to completely overhaul your website - less than a month before Christmas! Now it's down more than it's up and even when it's up, it's like some twisted game whether your postage will get to the point where you have to play lucky PDF readers to actually print it! I used to be a supporter of Royal Mail, but if this is how they see customer service, the sooner the monopoly is broken, the better.

I think the PDF format is very good for distributing a document to a lot of people without having to worry if the formatting will be different. The more recent versions make it nice for the end user to fill out a form and save/print it. I can't think of a single technology that does these as consistently as the PDF format.

If you have concerns about the security of adobe reader then simply use a different free viewer. There are lots out there even though I find that the Adobe reader properly supports all the capabilities and is more consistent than most other readers. HUD has switched official support from Adobe reader to the Nuance reader, but I don't really look to them for advice on software.

Bill

The unfortunate reality is that it isn't so much that browsers are broken - it's HTML. HTML is a stateless, static text formatting standard. And it's pretty much the same as it was in the mid-nineties. Technology has moved on hugely since then - but HTML is still there, still, well, just sitting there - It just has lots of JavaScript friends surrounding it to try and make it look good.

I like HTML5 and Html+css. It's useful when you need a kick web-interface for a project.

Voice Recognition also makes the cut. Frankly, no one has ever gotten to perfection on it, be it siri, vlingo, windows vista and 7 and even the flagship product of Garmin, the Nuvi. When it works it saves a lot of time, but accent, pronunciation etc etc can make recognition a nightmare and one would end up wasting more time on getting it right as against manually doing whatever it was that he/she wanted to get done through the voice command.

Next would be Java Enterprise Application Servers. Seriously, the same EAR file is supposed to work across them all right? Wrong! The EAR I built works in weblogic but not in websphere. The one which loads fine in JBoss has serious issues with OC4J. It's a wreck. In Spite of following standards we have a good case of incompatiblity being the norm!

While I have to agree that Flash has been riddled with issues, some big some small, over the years, I have to also say :
Anyone who says Flash should die either :
1. Is not a _good_ Flash developer
2. Does no understand the technology

Flash, like almost any other platform, can be used in Good Ways and Bad Ways.
You can get Good Flash Developers and Bad Flash Developers.
Worse, you have a lot of Flash "developers" who are actually designers who dabble in Flash.

The end result is that Flash has gotten a bad name largely because of bad Development, not because the platform itself is bad.

To any naysayer out there, I ask one question :

What, right now, can replace Flash as a multi-platform, vector- and raster-art, animation package which streams high quality, optimised, video and can communicate with the Browser via JavaScript (a standard) and with other backend technologies (eg. PHP) easily via various methods (AMFPHP, JSON, XML, etc), and also provides decent 3D capabilities ?

So yes, it has its shortcomings, and you're welcome to ignore it and dont use it, but Flash has its place, especially in the desktop application field for a long while yet.

Flash apps are garbage. Maybe if someone that actually knew something about flash was writing them it would be different. But the apps I've seen and that we use are nothing more than junk.

You may want to try run that flash on a non premium supported OS and see how far you get with the working well thing. On linux flash sucks and sucks big, it crahses it hogs it's a pain.. It's broken because as a supposed web centric deployment system it's actually a microsoft centric web deployment system only, support for anything else is limited and bad, you need to climb out of the MS bubble.

Android, Linux, Mac...it's a major resource hog. Even the latest versions in Windows causes my GPU to spin up something fierce. Silverlight and HTML 5 apps don't do this.

Have to agree that McCrap is hopeless, but AVG seems pretty good.
McCrap is nowhere near as up-to-date with virus sigs as other tools and interferes with all sorts of other things. Can't believe how much trouble I had getting a Dell wireless printer to work with Windows 7 - until I deleted McCrap and replaced it with AVG.

In addition, McCrap is a tremendous resource hog.

I believe the proper term should be "Internet Security Suites"
I've tried them all (almost) from worst to best:
Norton - takes control of, consumes and destroys everything
McAfee - resource hog
Panda - meh
F-Secure - can get annoying
BullGuard - not bad
AVG - great for a freebie, but not quite the full compliment
ZoneAlarm - rather good, some performance issues
CA - very good but expensive
Kaspersky - the best by a mile, great value, actually works (I tested it with a live virus that McAfee and Norton couldn't even stop - shat my pants as I stupidly unzipped it on my non-backed-up PC. All 'cos McAfee's virus reporter wanted it in a password-protected zip, not a normal one.)

We had CA for 6 years, it never caught one virus. They even sent out a update with a false positive for windows system files and nuked 15 of our machines that got left on over night.

We tried eset for a 3 month trial and it was awesome, low resource, caught everything, but didn't work with 64bit systems.

Ended up with Vipre, catches stuff, but during scans and updates its a huge CPU hog. but it actaully stops stuff... Some of the menus and options do not function like they were deprecated, but the buttons left in the menus.

I have been using ESET for about 5 years. It is by far the most reliable anti-virus software available (excluding business class), low resource, etc. and I have had it running on 64-bit OS (started on Vista x64). I am certain there was a time when it was only 32-bit but that hasn't been the case for quite some time. One thing to note and I am certain it is true with all of them, that unless configured to do so, most anti-virus software will give the user a choice and unseasoned computer users shouldn't be allowed to be given a choice and yes, computers can still get infected.

Good to see I'm not the only one with the problem of VIPRE being a resource hog (see my comments on above post: http://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-353334-3533683). I'll agree that it actually stop lots of stuff but their biggest claim is that they are "fast-high performance and low impact on system resources" (this sentence taken directly from their add in Windows IT Pro magazine).

I don't have any experience with VIPRE that live up to that claim; in fact it is totally the opposite.

We have substantial experience with Kaspersky during 5 years of supporting users on hunderds of different computers, and we had some really annoying issues with the recurring "corrup virus definitions" en "blacklist is damaged". We have switched to Trend Micro wich is fare more stable.

I deal with virus removal on a daily basis.
The best solution really is Avast, with it's auto sandbox feature.
Also, Avast detects and blocks when network users try to open files on my shared drive - that's a feature I've not seen anywhere else.
I see Avast detect and remove malware left behind by mcafee, norton, avg and many others alll the time
IMO, for the average consumer, Avast has the best combination of effectiveness, user friendly GUI and price. (Also, Avast has the pirate talk language pack, which is just plain cool! ...kinda shows me there's actual people working on it, not some cold corporate entity)
I am also a fan of kaspersky and avira, but those tend to be a little too obtrusive for the average user.

That being said, no single A/V program is going to block EVERYthing by itself.
With today's malware, you always need more than 1 layer of protection.
On systems with enough RAM and CPU, I always install Ad-Aware along with Avast.
Using Avast and Avast/AdAware combination, I've not had a machine come back to me re-infected.
And, no matter what, Malwarebytes Antimalware is a MUST have tool.

Sorry folks, but AVG is just about crap anymore. When AVG 8 was the current release, they were on top of their game - but these days I see toooo many avg "protected" machines with major infections.

and, um, seriously y'all.... MS security essentials?
MS security is an oxymoron in itself.
They crash their own OS often enough with faulty updates, how can you possibly expect them to keep it safe from others.
Just 3 days ago, I worked on a machine with MS Security essentials - mbam found 244 infections and Avast found 20 infections.

On top of all that, one other poster hit the nail on the head - often times, there's no way to protect the operating system from the moron users.
Another tech in my office has a favored diagnosis - EBKAC (error Between Keyboard And Chair)

Also, I would like to agree with everyone who said printers are horrible.
I HATE printers.
I mean, they're necessary and all, but dang. what a nightmare network printing can be.
Also, even though they make good printer hardware, HP's software sucks B.I.G. time.

Symantec and Mcafee are crap. System hogs. Vipre is pretty useless also. They all inform about the virus AFTER it has installed itself. There is very little real time protection. Avg works very well.

AVG cant stop spyware that are in its definition -- Many spyware disabled AVG before it could react.. Experienced this anytime. Once you have manually killed the processes for the spyware, AVG wakes up and says "Hey, look!!.. I found something" and of course, these are leftover of spyware that you removed manually...

MS Security Essential is the best
TDSSKiller form Kaspersky -- best in removing rootkits (but that is after the infection). I cant comment on Kaspersky as a whole as I never used it.
Symantec products are good only when you have 4 GB or more RAM and your machine is fairly new
McCafee is crap. But stinger can be useful at times when the machine is already infected
rest of the free stuff -- well it all comes to how good they update there software to the emerging trends in spyware and virus attacks. After so many years, I still get amazed by the techniques (or part of Windows registry) new spyware uses to attack a machine (please do not go into Windows vs. Linux vs. Mac debate. Windows is still the most widely used)

Outlook / Exchange and browsers "plain broken"??? Nonsense. Outlook works great for me. Firefox and IE work fine for me too. Is it web standards we should be looking at as browser just seem to keep catching up with them.

I'd say these are more software applications than technologies.
And yeah, what's wrong with outlook? I can't find anything comparable, and if your IT department has issues with it, perhaps they should consider observing the manual and revising their configuration.
Browsers? If they were "broken" no-one would be able to browse the Internet. Though I will admit I'm having difficulty finding a different browser from IE that works faster and is fully functional with all add-ons and scripts.

I used Outlook for many years in a corporate environment and didn't see that many problems. However, I happened to be at Siemens when the "I Love You" bug shut the company network down for 2 days. That's when I got serious about learning Linux.

If you are using a standalone email client for a home computer, I think I like Thunderbird better for security reasons although you lose the calendar and some of the other niceties. If that's the case, you just have to be aware that Microsoft-haters around the world are trying to shut your installation of Outlook down and be very careful about what you click.

I agree with you about the browsers... it's web standards. I haven't had problems with Firefox. I am a bit jumpy about IE due to past security issues.

1. Norton any version, just too horrible to support.
2. Airprint, and they complain about Flash.
3. File sharing with IOS 5 and a PC via (cloud) try it !
4. Sorry Kaspersky, you have caused too many software breakdowns
5. WebDav. So sad.
6. OOPL's, Jackson still reigns ( for those old enough). OOPl's are not properly understandable by 75% of programmers. If you cant debug software after a night out then its broke.
7. Majority of Apps, 95% of them are functionless - fun tho.

Things that do work.:-

1. ThinClient, RDP, and LogMeIn to you, thank you for my life back
2. AVG for letting my software work correctly.
3. Quickbooks, yes it can be problematical, but accountants and bookeepers understand it. You can also interface databases and systems to it. Try doing that simply with Sage.

Logmein and it's companion Logmein Hamachi - both the spherical objects of the proverbial dog. ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL facilities.

Yes, I agree with LogMeIn and I would agree that Hamachi works but the performance (at least two years ago) was very lackluster when compared with file transfers via LogMeIn File Manager. I was hoping that the Hamachi VPN would provide the means to copy files at a rate similar to LogMeIn File Manager which it didn't. However, as far as a VPN solution without having to utilize VPN routers it does serve the purpose. Can't say that neither were bug free but they do what they are supposed to do with not a lot of bugs.

I love LogMeIn. It works great with Mac too.
Hamachi is of course wonderful

I love LogMeIn as well -- even the free version is quite useful, especially for basic tech support.

of being one of the most secure RDP solutions. I use it to protect my clients. I just don't trust any other just yet.

I agree, QuickBooks is a thing that do work.. I never has issue in administration of QuickBooks -- backup, upgrades, application level issues or whatever. I agree there are sometimes issues within a file or some features. However, the users know better to deal with these. They are the exerts and if you are having any issues with some features, contact some experts or become one. Do not blame the application. It is Lifeline for many.

I had a quickbooks install where on one machine it crashes regularly through the day for no reason. Rebuilt the persons profile, replaced the machine and finally swapped some cables. Now it only crashes once every couple days. The machine it was installed on has been in place and running perfectly for about two and a half years before the quickbooks install.

To be honest, my biggest complaint about quickbooks is Inuit's licensing model. It seems like you have to pay an arm and a leg to get anything more than basic functionality.

Bill

Agreed that it can be a bit pricey for your average business or home user...it's just that the next step up (beyond Enterprise, their $3-11K uberversion; Intuit doesn't make anything above this level) makes even Enterprise look dirt cheap by comparison.

As for administration, making backups, etc, it's really an issue of getting it done. I always spent a certain chunk of time on the installs sitting down with the Admin and showing him how the user filters and Audit Trail work, asking them "who do you want to have access to X?", et al, and also stressing the importance of simply backing up the data file regularly. I had sooo many tech support calls that could have been resolved in five or ten minutes if the users had done regular backups...Instead, I get a response like "Backups??? O_O" or "Uhm....what month is it?" or "I thought the server did that? ("Great! Does anyone here know how to Restore your server backups?" "Uhhhhh...")

Even on a file that gets light use, most of it when the CPA comes in twice a month to do data entry, I encourage places to backup no less than once a week. If you do, say, a hundred transactions a day, backup daily. Several hundred to a thousand, consider twice-daily backups. And I'm NOT talking about server backups, I mean the one from within QB (or PT) -- It takes two minutes, unless your file is either huge (Over 500MB for Enterprise, 250MB for others), or your network is interfering in some way.

There's no such thing as "too many backups". When asked how often you NEED to backup, my usual response was "OK, what is your tolerance for re-entering lost data by hand..." ^_^

It's appropriately named.

Just the other day I was standing over someone's shoulder when some drive by infection rolled right over Symantec Endpoint, I've seen the same thing with MSE.

I'm thinking these articles are increasingly influenced by TR's advertising relationships.

Full disclosure -- In a former IT job, I worked for a consulting firm that did third party sales and support for users of both QuickBooks Accounting software (QB) and their main competitor, Peachtree Accounting software (PT). I was certified in both programs, but I am no longer in the accounting industry.

I won't deny what you mentioned -- QB definitely has its issues, but it is a matter of paying for what you get, and it's downright "Maytag reliable" compared to PT. Both QB and PT are smallish, low-end programs as far as accounting is concerned, and their sub-$1000 products are explicitly not intended for use even in TerminalServer environments (I did not see that mentioned, so I was wondering if that could be part of the issue). The next step up would be the larger packages from Sage (QB/Intuit doesn't go above SMB-level), which can easily be around $10K+ to buy, setup, and install, and run into the thousands per month to maintain; they're obviously meant for larger businesses, and that's where the real investment in their programming goes (and it shows). The last major headache with QB was in 2006 -- a Flash issue which was easy to bypass; and both it and PT had MAJOR problems with that year's Norton (and sometimes, still do, to the point where the recommended solution is "Uninstall Norton and get another AV").

QB's occasional network issues aside, if you think it's bad about that...? Try Peachtree. Keep in mind that PT is far older -- there are even people still using the MS-DOS releases (they run fine and dandy under WinXP), simply because it's more reliable than the modern versions. As sad as that may be, when it goes down, it goes down HARD.

In my experience with both programs --

QB is simpler to use, especially for non-accountants; it has a smoother learning curve, and it much more user-friendly. It's the Windows XP of accounting. It has its problems as far as its rather simplistic database structure is concerned, and it has almost no built-in end-user accessible DIY data correction available. On the other hand, it doesn't need them nearly as often. I have found that their network issues mainly crop up when you have more than one computer attempting to act as the Host (NOT the same thing as "where the data is physically located", aka "the server" as far as QB is concerned), causing all data requests to be routed through it, slowing everything down; of course, if that comp crashes or gets turned off while someone is entering data... >_ The issue with this is that the program makes it incredibly easy to become a Host when you don't intend to be, and deactivating Hosting is *not* as simple as just unchecking an option box.

PT, on the other hand, is really intended at the old-school, pen & paper ledger accountants who either never wanted to computerize in the first place, or who were quite happy with the DOS versions, TYVM; it's the Windows NT of accounting (no, not 2000...I wish). Its learning curve is much closer to climbing a brick wall, but it can be more powerful than QB once you get used to it. On the tech side, it has a very in-depth data repair utility (Integrity Check), which is normally hidden from the end-user with very very good reason -- if your data gets to the point where you NEED to have it reindex your data structure, one table at a time, you have some major problems anyway. It is also FAR, far more twitchy when it comes to network irregularities (e.g., it wants its data, in which every "file" is represented by a folder with 40+ separate files) in one particular place, but it won't actually stop you from, dropping it wherever you want. This becomes an issue especially when companies want to store their data on an NAS or something similar -- which neither PT nor QB officially support. PT's main issue is that the slightest network hiccup really WILL cause the whole schmeer to come crashing down in your face, or even corrupt the database. A lucrative market is out there in Peachtree database repair. Expect to drop at least $400-700 per incident for competent assistance.

One of the age-old legacy issues from PT, which still had not been fixed as of the last time I used it (about a year ago) was that a bad year-end "close" of the accounting data would corrupt your data file in ways which will generally not become apparent unless you know exactly what to look for, but which will screw you up down the line and cause significant data loss. The manifestation of the bug is part of the issue: It does the Close (forcing you to Backup the data first), *tells the user* that the Close screwed up( which specifically says stop now and restore that Backup), and then jumps to the default "Close Successful" screen. After a long slog at the computer, far too many people apparently assume that only the "success" screen was true (we got plenty of business from this issue), not even mention it, and move on with their lives. Protip: If you use PT and suspect that this may be an issue, check the size of your logfile for your Company Data. It should be in the low 100's of KB at most, as it's plain text. If it's several MB in size and is full of errors referencing zero-dollar transactions and "invalid periods", this problem has hit you. Call someone for tech support; I hope you have a service plan with someone, as it can be time consuming and expensive to fix, and even a "fix", in this case means one of two things: Restoring your Pre-Close backup as you should have to begin with, or making a list of all of the transactions you lost ...which will be most or all of them since the last Close...so you can re-enter them by hand and delete the bad ones.

I suppose what I'm trying to say here is, yes, QB has its issues and a certain leel of Brokenness, but PT -- its only real competitor does, as well. I've not used MS's (defunct) version, nor any of the free alternatives, but I would assume that they are even more suspect, and likely just as unstable. You want cheap and quick? QB and PT are the way to go, think of them as the Ford 150 of accounting -- their "lower end" stuff goes from around $200-1100; the "Medium size" versions, Enterprise and Quantum, respectively, are in the $3K-10K range (tho they invariably include a year of upper-tier, priority support directly from the manufacturers; well worth the (optional) yearly fee if you even need them once a year. You need and want Power, buy an 18-Wheeler (like MAS90) and be prepared to pay through the nose, but you will get what you pay for. Note -- by "Medium", I mean 60-100 employees and $1Mil a year. Stuff like MAS90 comes into play once you've left those in the dust, it's overkill before that point.

I have to agree on Acronis B&R.
I changed one of the settings on the main server network card and had to do a complete re-install, as it would not recognise the license server anymore (even though the license server is on the same machine?).
Just lately it has failed to do any backups at all as it couldnt find any source drives to backup, even though it has been backing up the same drives for the last 18 months.
Some of the Acronis responses on the forums are laughable, you can plainly see that on occasions the techs are guessing solutions until (usually a forum member) comes up with a valid answer..

Boy are you wrong about Flash. It seems Techrepublic never has anything good to say about Microsoft and Adobe. Man, you are stuck in the 90's. Get a grip. The internet is always evolving and these Companies are always evolving with it. That's why all the updates. You have to stop picking on these Companies just because their Numberr 1. Its old and and a real TURNOFF.

It went from being a good product on Windows to a lousy product on everything very quickly. It's been full of exploits for years now and the performance penalty on any non-Windows OS is unacceptable (Android, Linux, Mac OS X, etc).

Can you explain why a web-based technology now requires GPU support to run properly?

You say Quickbooks is bad?

You sir, have never had to deal with SIMPLY ACCOUNTING. That program gave me enough gray hairs and fits of cursing that would make a sailor blush.

There is nothing, and I do mean NOTHING that compares to how horrible an accounting software is Simply Accounting. For one person doing accounting, it's ok. But try to network that thing and have multi-users? Oooooh crap. Then the fun begins. It's horrible. backups done in SA can corrupt at a drop of a hat.

And if you want to have tech support? Forget it. Phone lines are stuck in the 90's, the forums are nothing but a PR's handbook for company apologetics.

And the worst part? Accountants swear by it!!

Oracle software tends to be flakey, sluggish, hideous 1990's proprietary UI and it falls over when the wind blows the wrong way.
I have worked on at least 20 major projects at different companies, with direct Oracle support, in-house DBAs and consultants and have never had an Oracle implementation of anything go smoothly. Every single project that used Oracle overran on time and budget, and was almost invariably the cause of any performance issues or unplanned downtime. In comparison, the Microsoft components in the projects were bullet-proof and cheap.

I am including Oracle DB's and Oracle VM in this mix.

3: Ubuntu Unity
Agreed. It complicates more than helps. I also agree that they should use Gnome 3 in the main distro.

6: Web browsers
Agreed also. Each browser has its strengths and weaknesses. The browser wars have basically came to a stalemate.

7: Outlook
Like some others posted, I think Outlook compared to our other options is about the best. Sure it's a heavy app compared to Thunderbird or even Evolution, but it makes up for it in features. And sure Outlook works better with Exchange, it was developed specifically as a client for Exchange.

8: Predictive typing
Hate it.

9: Consumer-grade antivirus
The general rule of thumb in information security is there is no system that is 100% secure. Which is the better antivirus? Based on my yearly evaluations of these products, it depends on the version that year. One year, I chose Avast and it worked great. But 2 years later, they were slow on updates and new features so I changed. When Symantec 360 was launched, it was heavy app. So I chose Mcafee. But these were on the corporate level. Concerning consumer products, first, I do not trust free antiviruses. It's rare to get anything for free and when you do, it's not always what you expect. Basically free antiviruses just don't get the big stuff and a big part of them don't have an on-access scanner . Concerning paid products, I basically follow my rule concerning corporate products, depends on the year and version. Nothing is 100% secure, not even Linux or Mac OSX.

10: Desktop multi-touch form factor
Hate it. In fact, I don't buy cell phones that are just touch. I need a keypad or keyboard. I haven't tried a desktop multi-touch yet but I can imagine I'll have the opinion and problems.

I don't believe the technologies are "broken". They just need improvements. Just imagine if we had the same opinion of the first cell phones or other first technologies.

I don't use Exchange with Outlook but most of my email is delivered via IMAP. IMAP is wonderful for users that have desktop(s), laptop(s) and mobile devices, yet since at least Outlook 2003, IMAP support in Outlook is very poor. Configuring an IMAP account has been decent since Outlook 2007 but the problem is that with multiple email accounts is it very sluggish when changing accounts and it has this terrible bug where it loses handles (I use Taskinfo and get a warning when the system is using too many Win32 handles and I can see that Outlook has them) requiring me to exit and restart Outlook.

Browsers, being a web developer I couldn't agree more. My favorite is Firefox but I am not certain what they were after releasing 5 major versions in 6-7 months?

Acronis - horrible networking support and even after isolating a very specific culprit, after 6 months there is still no remedy in sight.

In general I am in complete agreement with your list!

AVG sux alright. How about ESET? Never had any complaints about them. Works great!

I agree that Acronis has its problems but, it is much better than nothing at all (or windows backup). Exchange is nothing to set up compared to Lotus and even less of a chore to maintain. I flushed all of my Symantec licenses (150) 3 years ago for Avast. Not one machine infected since the change.

Broken? I find this article highly pessimistic. Yes, there are some problems with all of the above likely, but broken? I have no major issues supporting Outlook and our exchange. I have no problems with the Unity Desktop in Ubuntu, but more with Gnome 3 (except for less configuration options), but this doesn't make it broken. I can't say much about Quickbooks as I am haven't used it in years. It seems all of the "issues" above are just issues one encounters or at least I have encountered with most anything in the IT world. It would be miraculous to find anything that doesn't have issues, but this really doesn't make them broken. If so, everything is broken.

Outlook... 2010 is just plain brilliant. I've had to use Lotus Notes in my latest role, and that IS broken...

Android is all it's forms (which is part of the issue).. it's hard to use, and doesn't deliver over IOS/WP7, but until a user (no techie) uses it, they think it's OK.. Every non-techie user of Android I know has regretted the purchase.

Yes and MS security essentials is the bees-nees, and makes the PC as safe (safer the OSX) then the others... it's no longer an issue... nothing to see, move on.

Please try some original ideas next time...

- Wireless networking and Bluetooth
- ADSL (after it rains)
- Photo printing (the same as it appears on the screen)
- Service provider invoicing!!!

..... but having worked for 11 years doing IT support for an airline - almost ANY Boeing software seemed to be broken in one way or another. Just hope that improvements have been made for the Dreamliner. "Fly-by-wire" gives me the shudders - just the thought of some hairy-arsed American programmer's mentality between the pilot and the actual flying control surfaces - doesn't bear thinking about.
Pull back joystick to "Climb" - computer says "No!" AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!!
"Throttle up" - Computer says "No!" - aircraft lands in trees near Paris. (Yes, I know that was Airbus, but the principle is the same)

I am surprised no one has mentioned Avira yet, especially in the main article.
I have used Avira for over 9 years and NEVER gotten any kind of infection.
This is truly a shame that more people don't know about/use it.

Jack: you are a man after my heart: I've suffered all of these and could not have put up a better list myself: well in!

Been running Exchange and Outlook since 1997. What problems? It has been flawless for us other than one human induced error. Other than that it just works.

Linux experts should not be writing about Outlook and Exchange...II don't see much Microsoft experience in your bio.

The faults of QuickBooks might be solved if the program were owned by a better company. I have a small retail store, and one day, some kids working for Intuit's merchant accounts subsidiary talked me into signing up, but the setup never worked, and I was getting charged $40 a month for a service I couldn't use, with a $300 penalty threatened if I canceled. Instead, I ended up changing bank accounts and solving the problem that way. Ever since then, any and all solicitors approaching the store are forcibly turned away, with extreme prejudice.

I'll chime in with my latest disappointment. It takes about 30 minutes to burn the label, BUT to get anything like good contrast you have to burn it twice, even then the contrast will be mediocre. The discs are expensive and the label editors fiddly. The final problem which I found buy digging through the Lightscribe forum old messages is that after a year or two, the label will likely fade out and be useless.

Looks like the best dvd labelling solution is the good old sharpie pen.

People don't think about music as a business unless they're complaining about how much money we (.2%) make, but high-tech musicians use software for both performance and recording. DAW (Desktop Audio Worstation) software is an area with no detectable standards for interfaces or implementations of key components like MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) and VST ((Virtual Studio Technology), both critical to making it all work together. By the time you get the tech all working (for about 15 minutes), the creative impulse is long gone.

Outlook?
I'm sorry I'm going to have to go with the author on that one. We have 20 people in our office and if one isn't having a problem with outlook another one is. Not that is is the worst I've seen, for the most part it does work. But I've seen it totally crash a computer.

I had many of these opinions from years ago, and hey have proven correct. Some may remember that Outlook was "suspended from school" because it would run viruses and Trojan attachments to SPAM without asking - that was only one of its many "features". Needless to say I avoid Outlook like the plague.

I have also avoided Flash for years, and some may remember the real reason - that if a hacker sets a web page to pull the Flash engine from a site where it has been "re-engineered" (instead of from the manufacturer's source), that hacker can actually take over your machine and "have his way with it". And with you and your data.

One item not mentioned in this discussion is "The Cloud". I never cease to wonder at the ability of "Marketing Geniuses" to come up with more ways to separate us from our cash - and from our data. The idea that all of our applications will always be somewhere else - and that all of our data will always be somewhere else - is abhorrent to me... with 2 Terabyte hard drives less than $150 nowadays, why would I want to pay more for storage of everything that should be securely stored on MY computer to be on someone else's?

I never see discussions about the possibility of losing the internet connection in the middle of doing any work, far less important stuff like sales presentations and accounting, the possibility of a hacker sniffing the line to access data, and I wonder - why?

I think the executives of this world - who apparently barely know about business and management and are barely technically functional outside of texting - are to blame for taking Ol' Bill's corporate bait - and they take the whole enchilada hook, line and sinker.

Microsoft gets richer and richer by persuading every business in the world that they simply MUST install the latest Suite of Microsoft Bloatware as soon as it comes out... and it's as if Billy boy has a money pipe directly into every corporate bank account, because the new versions magically appear and render almost every document format before it obsolete in a matter of seconds.

".doc" to ".docx". I rest my case.
(Few of the "suits" seem to know about such things as the "Save As Type..." options".

The .doc to .docx came about because of the complaints from open source members that the .doc format was propitiatory and people should use ODF because it was an open standard. People wanted an XML based instead of binary based format because it is more flexible. I personally wouldn't blame MS for changing the document type after all the flax they have taken for their binary format.

Bill

Just works. Never had a problem in 8 years. It's also unfair and disproportionate to single out a relatively minor product for your #1 rant on the same page as moans about Microsoft, Adobe, the Universe, and everything.

When I read the headline, I thought of Quickbooks, and I wasn't surprised to see it headed up the list. When things go bad, it's just butt ugly. When it blows up, take good notes for when your accountant asks you all those "what the ..." questions at year end . Avoid all "upgrades" as long as possible.

If you cannot get Exchange/Outlook running and configured correctly, then hang up your IT hat and go flip burgers. It's not that hard and to whine about it here is a cop-out.

Once it is broken from it's syncing it is gone and I can't figure out how to get it back. I can't stand the concept of syncing with itunes.

ITunes is a horrid experience...it installs all over the place and just try making it go away. I installed it once last summer (in XP) to take advantage of a $25 ITunes card someone gave me, and ended up having to use System Restore to "uninstall" the monster. If I lived & breathed Apple, I'd get over it, but I don't.

I love AVG. So do many I know. I used the free version for years and it was outstanding (no I do not work for them nor do I know any one who does) and I bought the paid version.

FireFox works well for me. IE doesn't always but does one thing AOL and FireFox doesn't do and then FireForx does something those two do not do. Insanity but like FireFox the best.

Felt we should have unbiased opinions on here and these are mine.

Other than Outlook, what contact data base, e-mail, etc. would you recommened. Does anyone have any experience with ACT?

It can bring an enterprise network to its knees; it doesn't work so hot even for the Apple devices it was designed for; and it maliciously craps out on other peoples' OSes. Its existence leads developers to count on it, so they neglect to provide alternative (non-proprietary) methods of device connectivity for the software that they write. I say, Au revoir, Bonjour!

Almost any browser does most of what I want it to do. Even IE has evolved enough for me to use it as my default - although it'd be nice if M$ would get over itself for having discovered tabbed browsing years after the rest of the world did.

My peeve is with rendering. Why does Google Calendar look great in IE and awful in Chrome?

I was interested in your comments on touch screens, which you see as best suited to a horizontal state, like a keyboard. My fear of touch screen is that the technology is crap because of poor software. My nephew has spent nearly ??1000 on a Dell Suite laptop with i7 CPU and plenty RAM. The problem is that he had to shut it down because the mouse was flying about like something possessed and the program kept shutting down. He has spent money with Dell asking them how to fix this and they have failed and now are silent; I assume the cash has run out and needs another top up. I have reinstalled everything including the drivers and the contents of the CD that promises so much new experiences. The thing is the situation was exactly the same as before. I removed the N-trig Duo Sense Multi Touch package and now the computer works as a computer worth about ??400. I have written to Dell on behalf of my nephew and in spite of three weeks passing no reply or acknowledgement of any kind has been received. I think Dell is declaring that their touch screen technology is broken and they cannot fix it. So I put it forward as an addition to your list of broken software. I would appreciate if you could find out about this and make an article of it to help the many suffering the same from Dell and other suppliers of this broken technology. If you have anything specific concerning my nephew???s plight an email with suggestions as to how to go about getting a fix would be well appreciated, my email address is lodged with TechRepublic.

ANT, for starters. SPRING for another.

After 40 years using progressively more refined (for humans) computer languages, and processors that winkle out all sorts of human error, and IDEs and debuggers that do things like definition and reference searches, XML tramps on all that in seven-league boots.

Here's another piece of crap: GIT.

Outlook broken! Are you serious? Outlook is an outstanding piece of software and its integration with Exchange and the rest of the Microsoft universe is nothing short of spectacular. Having lived through Groupwise, Lotus Notes, the ignominy of the Sun/Oracle crap and multiple POP systems, I can honestly say that Outlook/Exchange is head and shoulders ahead of the competition. But then again, you are a Linux guy. Never know pragmatism to be the fort?? of that particular group.

Cheers,

Andr??

Quickbooks... blech. My original installation had the data backup on my home server... don't do THAT, folks! Dead on about the reinstall, even though I paid $10 for them to send me a disc, it didn't work and the (nice) tech support I got from Asia Minor was unable to help me in any way except to tell me to download the latest version. The security code they gave me to validate the install of the latest version didn't work either. QB, let's get your game on or I'm just going to have to find somebody's home-brewed app for Access. (Tried GnuCash on one of my Linux boxes, too complicated... you actually have to know something about accounting).

I am not exactly sure what Ubuntu Unity is. I have one Ubuntu machine upstairs and my granddaughter seems to love it although now she got an iWhatever and wants to put all of her music on it so she's using Grandma's computer. All I can say about Ubuntu is whatever version I have with Gnome is hosed. Linux is supposed to be multi-user, right? So why do I have to REBOOT every time I want to log off and log another user on? I installed Kubuntu right over Ubuntu and now I have an unholy mess of epic proportions. That's probably my own fault, but I have to say this... Ubuntu's attempt to control applications and nudge people over to commercial apps is a travesty towards the spirit of Linux. I hope Linus is tooting in their general direction.

If you are looking for a good consumer-grade anti-virus let me suggest F-Prot. I discovered them when looking for a Linux anti-virus years back and tried the Windows version, have been a customer ever since. They have software for all versions of Windows and the cost for licensing multiple installations is extremely reasonable. I haven't had a virus problem since we installed that here about 10 years ago. Now if only they came out with a spyware/hijacker product that worked right along with it....

Ever tried tracking down 'rouge' email... Outlook takes apart email as soon as it gets it, strips headers from the body then breaks apart individual message parts as well. Ask a client to show source code of an email with headers... without doing any regedit first.

And go back a bit with external email defaulting to MS formated email and not mime so any other client had problems with it.